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The Gujarat Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) on Friday arrested 35-year-old Habib Miyan, wanted in the 2005 attack on the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru, from Agartala in Tripura. He will be produced before a local court in Agartala on Saturday where the police would seek his transit remand in order to shift him to Karnataka for detailed interrogation, an official said.

The two attackers had hurled hand grenades and opened fired randomly at the institute when an international conference was underway on December 28. One retired professor was killed while four others had suffered injuries in the attack. In 2011, a court in Bangalore had convicted six of the accused. ATS sources said several accused were still at large and arrest warrants had been issued against them.Besides, ATS officials said that Habib’s role was revealed in the statement of another accused, Sabahuddin, a resident of Patna, who is among the convicts. Sabahuddin had allegedly told the Bengaluru police that he was assisted by Habib in crossing over to Bangladesh at least twice during the planning of the attack.

“We had kept surveillance and found his movement suspicious. After various attempts, we arrested him. This operation was jointly conducted by the Agartala police,” said Deputy Superintendent of Police, ATS, K K Patel, who led the operation, along with his two subordinates – inspector Nikhil Brahmbhatt and sub-inspector Chandrashekhar Panara – from Ahmedabad.

NEW DELHI: Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has said that all devices using Aadhaar authentication will have to adhere to its new encryption standards from June 1.

The move is aimed at adding another security layer to the hardware at a time when such devices are all set to take the centre stage in biometric-based digital payments.

"We have recently come out with new specifications and asked manufacturers and vendors to go for STQC certification as per the new standards. We have advised that from June 1, they should get devices on the new specifications and that the existing devices should be upgraded to the new norms," Ajay Bhushan Pandey, CEO of UIDAI told PTI.

UIDAI is the nodal body responsible for rolling out Aadhaar, the 12-digit unique identification number that identifies residents based on their biometrics. While more than 112 crore Aadhaar have been generated in the country, the Aadhaar authentications have crossed 500 crore, and 100 crore e-KYC have been done on the platform.

Pandey, however, emphasised that only those devices that wish to use Aadhaar authentication, would have to meet the new standards.

Only such 'registered devices' that incorporate the new specifications would be allowed to perform Aadhaar authentication.

"We are continuously trying to tighten the security. We felt that while the system is secure, we want to further improve the security by building one more layer. So, if the device itself can be encrypted it will be harder to break into the system," he said.

Simplifying this, he said that while two locks exist currently - one at the level of agency and another at UIDAI the new system will place a third lock on the biometric device itself.

He said that UIDAI has been been in talks with the device manufacturers for almost 1.5 years for implementation of the new specifications. In this period, Aadhaar has seen its numbers swell both in terms of enrolment and authentication.

The Aadhaar daily authentications now stand at almost 2 crore against 10 lakh about 1.5 years ago.

"Unless they see demand, no manufacturer will manufacture as per your specification. Now manufacturers too are showing interest...They know when they make specially designed biometric fingerprint scanner for Aadhaar and put another lock as per UIDAI's requirement, it will sell in the market. Hence, they are open to the idea," Pandey said.

A report from the Bangladesh government to the Union home ministry over the recent spike in infiltration of terrorists to India has rung alarm bells in the security establishment.

According to the report, 2016 witnessed an over-three-fold increase over 2015 in infiltration by Harkat-ul-Jihadi al-Islami (HuJI) {This is HuJI-Bangladesh} and Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) extremists into the border states of West Bengal, Assam and Tripura. The development assumes significance as the NIA has found overseas terror links and the direct role of JMB in the October 2014 Burdwan blast at Khagragarh in which two suspected terrorists were killed.

The report said approximately 2,010 HuJI and JMB operatives had entered the three states. While nearly 720 men made a safe passage through the Bengal border, the remaining 1,290 are suspected to have entered through Assam and Tripura. Bengal government officials are sceptical about the report, but even if just a close estimate, the number is disturbing as intelligence reports pegged the number of infiltrators in 2014 and 2015 at 800 and 659, respectively.

"We are trying to gather information to confirm the veracity of the report," a senior Bengal home department official said. However, Assam police is concerned about the development.

"There is certainly an increase in terrorist activity because over the last six months, we have arrested 54 JMB operatives," additional director-general of police (SB), Assam, Pallab Bhattcharyya, said. "We have formed a high-powered committee of top police officers and MLAs to check infiltration. They visit the border regularly and conduct meetings with security forces," he added. There is also information that JMB secretary Iftadur Rehman entered India on January 12 this year on a fake passport and has established contact with linkmen in Assam and Bengal. He may also visit Delhi, intelligence sources said. {I am not surprised by the large-scale infiltration of Bangladeshi terrorists who are under Pakistani control into India. HuJI-B is a branch of HuJI Pakistan and JMB is practically an avatar of LeT in Bangladesh. Major Pasha, (Major Abdur Rehman Hashem Syed) of the Pakistani Army who is the chief of 'Project Karachi', the project to pit Indians against Indians through jihadi terrorism, controls both these groups. Besides, these groups are also facing pressure from the Hasina government in BD.}

Iftadur's real name is Sajjad Hussain. "Apart from that we also have information that on January 18, a meeting between linkmen from Assam, West Bengal and New Delhi and the top JMB and Hu-JI leadership took place in the Mymensingh district of Bangladesh," a source said.

According to senior cops, there has been a change in the operational mechanism of these militants post-Khagragarh and this was creating problems in tracking them. "Previously, there were certain porous districts like Malda, Murshidabad or Nadia through which they came. Now, they are coming through Assam and Tripura and then entering West Bengal. This is easier and safer for them," a senior Bengal police officer said. "Being a riverine border, it is difficult for security agencies to keep vigil," the officer added.

In a suspected sabotage bid, 15 iron hooks that latched the iron rail to the concrete of the railway track were missing on the Hosur-Bengaluru railway line, about 1.7 km from the Hosur railway station. Along with the hooks, 9 metal liners were also missing from the iron rail.

The missing hooks, also called clips, were spotted by railway track maintainer (gangman) Daniel, around 6.50 a.m. The clips were found missing in succession on one side of the iron rail of track number 161/100-200 running between Vikas Nagar and Annai Nagar, raising suspicion of sabotage.

The gangman managed to remove clips, alternately, from other stretches of the line and put these in the place of missing clips, also in alternate arrangement. After the Bengaluru railway division was alerted, the clips were replaced in time for the Inter-city from Bengaluru and the Nagercoil-Bengaluru Express that cross this section at 7.20 a.m. and 7.30 a.m. respectively. A team consisting of M. Suresh, Senior Security Commissioner, Bengaluru, inspected the line.

TN Police's Q-branch must get involved in this immediately. This could be the handiwork of the Maoists who are trying to seek revenge for the killing of a few top Maoist leaders including Kuppu Devaraj, a central committee member, and the arrest of a few.

Could the riot and ensuing violence at Trombay on Saturday night over a Facebook post have been avoided? That appears to be the case as the Trombay police seems be have been taken off guard despite knowing about the unrest among the public regarding the “offensive post”.

Moreover, it appears that the All India Majlise-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) corporator who has been accused of inciting the mob, Shahnawaz Khan, was also booked for rioting in two cases in 2014.

The police say they never anticipated that there would be riots in the area even after action was taken against the man who allegedly published the post. “The mob was instigated by the corporator and they had planned to attack the police station if we did not hand over the accused to them. When we refused their demand the first time, they went back. But we learnt later that another section of the mob was waiting at a spot near the police station, preparing to attack,” said senior inspector Annasaheb Sonur of Trombay police station.

Corporator Khan allegedly instructed the mob to fetch weapons like petrol bombs, lathi, stones and kerosene so that they could torch the police station. Nearly 200 youngsters in the area had answered his call and were assembled a few metres from the police station.

Incidentally, Trombay has been a high security zone and a sensitive area due to the presence of vital installations like BARC and the Naval armament depot.

Pandey wrote:Simplifying this, he said that while two locks exist currently - one at the level of agency and another at UIDAI the new system will place a third lock on the biometric device itself.

He said that UIDAI has been been in talks with the device manufacturers for almost 1.5 years for implementation of the new specifications. In this period, Aadhaar has seen its numbers swell both in terms of enrolment and authentication.

The Aadhaar daily authentications now stand at almost 2 crore against 10 lakh about 1.5 years ago.

"Unless they see demand, no manufacturer will manufacture as per your specification. Now manufacturers too are showing interest...They know when they make specially designed biometric fingerprint scanner for Aadhaar and put another lock as per UIDAI's requirement, it will sell in the market. Hence, they are open to the idea," Pandey said.

while this is a right step say level 3, this doesn't solve the problem of unlicensed devices connecting to authenticate, as a next step they can mandate that the device have an inbuilt "RSA token fob" which is used to open a session with the server, only licensed devices can then connect.

Shafi Sheikh, a suspected ISI agent who played key role in mobilising people in Nepal and India to plant explosives at a railway track in Bihar last year, is said to have fled to Pakistan from Dubai, where he had been staying, a senior Home Ministry official said.

Before India and Nepal (where he is wanted in a double murder case) could request the UAE authorities to seek Sheikh’s custody, he had already left for Pakistan. Sheikh has been on the radar of intelligence agencies for long and has also been accused of pumping in fake currency into India through Nepal.

Nepal contact

Shamshul Hoda, a Nepalese businessman who first met the Pakistani national in Malaysia, then in Karachi and on several occasions in Dubai, told a National Investigation Agency (NIA) team, which interrogated him in Kathmandu last month, that the latter had asked him to “create mayhem” in India.

The Nepal police had arrested Hoda on his return from Dubai on February 2 for his alleged involvement in the murder of two people, who were initially hired to carry out “spectacular incidents in India.”

While Hoda confirmed that he had been asked by Sheikh to plant explosives at Ghorasan in Motihari, Bihar, on October 1 last year, he told the NIA team that he was unaware of any such plan with regard to the Kanpur and Kuneru railway derailments.Karachi visit

Hoda has told the Nepal police that he went to Karachi seven months back on Sheikh’s invitation, where he allegedly met three other persons.

“Hoda told us that he was not sure about the association of Shafi [Sheikh] and three others with Pakistan’s ISI but he says he was asked to do something spectacular in India. He says he stayed in a bungalow at Karachi for two days, where he was treated well and asked to rope in his local contacts to create trouble in India,” a Nepal police official said.

The NIA was tasked with investigating the three railway accidents for any terror-related conspiracy after Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu shot off a letter to Home Minister Rajnath Singh alleging “sabotage.”

Mr. Prabhu’s letter was sent after Moti Paswan, one of the three persons arrested by the Bihar police in January for his alleged involvement in planting a pressure cooker bomb at Ghorasan, claimed to have planted the bomb in Kanpur, which led to the derailment of the Indore-Patna Express on November 20, 2016.

Another accident in Ordnance factory in jabalpur.The frequent `accidents` in ammunition depots/ordnance factories should call for a thorough investigation. The frequency has increased surprisingly in the last decade or so.

while one likes their confidence, it would be nice if they invite ethical hackers to do the job, such a competition shouldn't be held just before a major election but then India is a country where there are elections in some corner or the other, probably this issue can be one of the reasons why they should have an across the board election season.

http://m.timesofindia.com/india/budgam- ... 874376.cms Three civilians were killed in security forces' action against protesters near an encounter site in Budgam district in Kashmir during an anti-militancy operation which ended with the killing of the lone militant. This is what happens when you dont take army chief's warning seriously. I hope this deters so called protesters interference in anti terrorist operations.

Sachin wrote:Miscreants rob train passengers in DharmapuriRailway sources suspect that the sabotage was the handiwork of those who knew how the signaling system worked. The driver of the train, while moving close to Doddampatti railway station after leaving Morappur junction in Dharmapuri district, stopped it as the signal light glowed red, police sources said.

The engine driver, after waiting for about 40 minutes at the place, had called the railway staff to get clearance to move his train, when the daring mischief by the robbers to sabotage the train came to light.

Seems to be a The Great Train robbery like nefarious scheme. A signalling cables were sabotaged which made the signal to show the red aspect. This happened at Morappur RS, in Dharmapuri Dt. TN. The area is known for its forests as well as naxal presence. But don't know what prompted the driver to wait for 40 mins, because this is a very busy trunk route and very many trains use the tracks. Don't know about the terrain; but generally the stations can be contacted using VHF Walkie Talkies (which every train driver & guard have these days). The fact that a train is just not crossing a specific signal can also be detected at the "signal panel".

Appears that for Bangladeshi descent Mohammaddens who had illegally migrated into Myanmar, India presents a better habitat than Myanmar. Bangladesh origin Mohammadden illegal migrants into Myanmar who have illicitly infiltrated into India from Myanmar are now attempting to make permanent their illegal residence in India by fradulently obtaining Aadhar Cards.

Looking forward to our Government ensuring that the demographic composition of Jammu is not changed by influx of Bangladesh origin Mohammadden illegal migrants from Myanmar that would result in Hindu’s and Sikh’s being ethnically cleansed from Jammu just as has been the unfortunate case of Kashmiri Hindu Pandit’s in the Kashmir Valley:

arun wrote:who have illicitly infiltrated into India from Myanmar are now attempting to make permanent their illegal residence in India by fradulently obtaining Aadhar Cards.

Not to nit-pick. UIDAI (and GOI) is very clear on one aspect. Aadhar card does not prove one's citizen ship, and is just a proof of identity. Citizenship is only there if the person has a passport (or is eligible for having a passport). Aadhar in a way may make it to track down these Rohingyas if they try to scoot else where.

^^^ You are indeed 800% correct in pointing out that having an Aadhar card does not confer Indian Citizenship. Hence my mention of fraudulently "attempting to make permanent their illegal residence in India" rather than mention of fraudulently acquiring Indian citizenship.

Interesting idea of Aadhar being used to keep track of undesirable elements. Never thought of that useful aspect of it .

“Isn't Whatsapp free? When the service is free and the user has the option of opting out from using the services, how can they be restrained from accessing the data sent through the medium created by them? It is a facility extended to you free of cost, take it or leave it," it had said.

But Harish Salve who was appearing for the petitioners had submitted that there is a need to regulate Whatsapp as it might pose a probable privacy threat. Salve had stated that the enormous amount of messages and calls made daily through Whatsapp has made it a “virtual telecom service provider, who stands to lose its licence in case of illegal tapping or accessing of calls or messages.” Salve had argued that Whatsapp had promised to protect the privacy of user data when it started operations in India in 2010 and this was a violation of its promise.

How the CIA Sponsored Indian Magazines that Engaged the Country’s Best WritersBy Joel Whitney

In 1967, much of the intellectual world learned that the United States had outsmarted itself. Two decades earlier, it had quietly created several vehicles for secret cultural patronage. The scheme was billed as necessary to fight cultural penetration and patronage of the Soviet variety, which was presumed to lie behind not just propaganda, but also student and labor unions, world peace conferences and more. To maintain their secrecy, then, many of these American vehicles, such as the Congress for Cultural Freedom, were launched under the CIA’s covert bureaucracies. The agency’s secret budget was seen as a way to circumvent debates in the US legislature, whose hardline right-wingers hardly could be convinced to fund “little” intellectual magazines, say, or classical music, or the haphazard paint splashes of Jackson Pollock.

The Indian intellectuals who had collaborated around one of the Congress’s magazines targeting the subcontinent, Quest (another was called Imprint) expressed similar indignation at the clumsiness of the scheme. Jayaprakash Narayan had worked with the Indian version of the Congress for Cultural Freedom, and wrote to his connected friends that “It was not enough to assess that the Congress had always functioned with independence . . . . The Agency was only doing what it must have considered useful for itself.” His colleague, K.K. Sinha, wrote to announce that he was quitting the organisation, adding, “Had I any idea . . . that there was a time bomb concealed in the Paris headquarters, I would not have touched the Congress.” The following short excerpt from Finks shows that the Americans and Europeans seeking to “help” India and other parts of the developing world to see the evils of Stalinism were indeed merely doing what they “considered useful” for the agency and themselves and worked often with little understanding of the cultural exchange expected by their international counterparts.

Jayaprakash Narayan shifted his focus around the same time as Encounter’s launch in England, and the launch of The Paris Review in New York and Paris. Independent India’s founders were among the leading practitioners of neutrality. This was because of Nehru’s socialism and the British occupation confirming much of the socialist critique. But these views were balanced by strong cultural ties to the English-speaking world. As such, India’s leaders refused to align solely with either the United States or USSR. Because of this, the CIA sought to penetrate India. It would do so by using the local affiliate of the Congress for Cultural Freedom as a foothold, and that affiliate would include Narayan and Minoo Masani among its members. India nevertheless vacillated from side to side, like a sail in changing winds. While US secretary of state John Foster Dulles saw neutrality as “immoral and shortsighted,” Nehru sought “to avoid entanglement in power politics and not to join any group of powers as against any other group.”

By some measures, Encounter also did a ham-fisted job of covering India. While many magazines of the CCF were intended as the local CCF vehicle for that country alone, Encounter was special. Remember that the “encounter” of the magazine’s title was originally rendered as “East-West Review” and was therefore an “East-West encounter.” But by focusing on the US special friendship with England, it gave short shrift to the subcontinent. For instance, there were zero articles devoted to world-renowned Indian film director Satyajit Ray during Encounter’s first decade.

Despite the United States’ best efforts, Nehru clung to his neutrality like a bachelor to his freedom. In 1951, he refused to let the second international CCF convene in India’s capital. He purportedly knew that the organization was an “American front.” However, given the growing strategic importance of the world’s most populous democracy, the CCF planners would not, as it went, “quit India.” They merely moved the conference from Delhi to Bombay (now Mumbai)

Ezekiel instituted principles that would define Quest throughout its life: “Everything about it must have some relevance to India. It was to be written by Indians for Indians—for in those days, we still glamourised everything foreign, including writers.” Ezekiel’s personality charmed many who worked with him long after Quest’s demise. A relentless mentor to younger poets and writers, he spent time in Chicago and recited to Saul Bellow the names of his own family members that he found in Bellow’s novel Herzog.

Excerpted from Finks: How the CIA Tricked the World’s Best Writers by Joel Whitney.

All websites and applications like WhatsApp, Facebook, Google and YouTube have their servers in the US. India has pointed out that it failed to get timely evidence from the “digital space” The US recently shared thousands of internet-based conversations between Jaish-e-Muhammed members

long time back there was news that although lot of chinese chatter is recorded, they have few people who can interpret mandarin

Paul wrote:Indian state reacts at the 11th hour. Need to see if present government is any different.

Will be a first direct intervention if it happens.

Won't happen. Link connecting Political leadership to lower security leadership is deeply rotten . Feedback from ground is completely vetted unless it confirms to ' the view' . It took some extreme 'creative' communication for PoK operation to happen . All this healing touch / winning heart & mind has almost neutered creative thinking unless it come from one of anglo-saxon military institution. RR was last brilliant desi idea & since then its all heart & mind idea or latest imported gizmo .

When we needed better protection gear for soldiers , we ended up buying more armored vehicles ! RR had specific road map with its requirement that was never filled except on ad hoc basis. Something is rotten in denmark !